Ride-through
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Behind the meter Building and running the plant
Google Cloud Says a Voltage Drop in the Utility's Feed, and the Breakers' Protective Action, Caused a Service Outage in One Zone
Google Cloud's incident report of July 25, 2026 names the root cause of an outage in its europe-west4-a zone as "a 3ms voltage drop in the power feed from the utility provider and subsequent utility breaker protective action."
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Loads That Leave the Grid: NERC's Reliability Insights on Large Computational Loads and Voltage Sensitivity
NERC's Reliability Insights of September 2026 describes large computational loads, data centers among them, that remove themselves from the grid when the voltage dips, in what it calls a familiar pattern. It reports changes by data centers that may have reduced the load lost in one event, and a load reduction in Virginia in July 2026 whose specifics are still being analyzed.
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"Fault Cleared Properly": PJM Reviews Its Load Transfer Events
PJM's operational review of October 6 lists three dates on which load transferred to backup generation. The slide for each describes a fault on a transmission line and carries the same line: fault cleared properly.
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"They Should Not Disconnect From the Grid": PJM's Account of the July 22 Load Transfer
On July 22, 2026, data centers in Virginia disconnected from the grid and switched to backup generation after a line fault. PJM's account of August 11 gives the sequence in two waves and what operators did, and reports that the first phase of new reliability standards will not address ride-through.
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Prior to Receiving a Request: NERC's Level 3 Alert on Computational Loads
On May 4, 2026, NERC sent the grid's planners, owners and operators a Level 3 alert on computational loads such as AI training, with seven essential actions and questions to answer by August 3. The alert says it "does not create a mandatory obligation to take the Essential Actions."
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Typically Without UPS or Backup Generators: NERC's Review of Crypto-Mining Load Loss in ERCOT
In January 2026 NERC reviewed 26 events, identified by ERCOT, in which crypto-mining facilities in Texas lost load in response to normally cleared transmission faults. Such facilities, it says, typically have no UPS systems or backup generators, unlike AI data centers, and some are transitioning toward AI or cloud workloads.
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Load That Did Not Return for Hours: NERC's Incident Review of a Data Center Load Loss
On July 10, 2024, faults on a transmission line in the Eastern Interconnection were cleared properly, and data centers in the area moved their load to backup power. NERC's incident review says most of the sustained load reduction came with the third voltage depression, and that this load did not return for hours.
